The Alpha's Unclaimed Mate (Jason and Laila) by Caroline Above Story novel Chapter 120

Laila’s POV

Just as I had gotten Ava settled back into her bed, after she had cried herself to sleep, my phone chimed with a text. I should have probably ignored it. I wanted to. But after everything that happened today, I knew there would be some fallout. I wasn’t the kind of person who would hide away from anything, would face the ramifications of what I had done head on. So I lifted my phone and I looked.

It was a text from Claire.

Emergency! Get back to the office right away!! BIG problems!

I had a bad feeling about that, and knew what it likely meant.

or Brittany – would want to spare my reputation from that

Jason had accused me of drugging him, hadn’t he? I doubted he accusation. For Claire to call me in, knowing I was at the hospital with Ava; this had to be beyond serious.

I didn’t want to leave Ava, especially when she had been so upset, but if this was the fallout, I both had to face it and had to try to fix it. I couldn’t do that from here.

Stepping out of Ava’s room, I asked one of the nurses I trusted to keep an eye on my darling daughter. Then I rushed back to work.

All of the lights were on in the office, with many people putting in overtime hours. As I stepped inside the building, there was a tension hanging in the air. Everyone stopped to look at me when I entered, and then whispered about me when I passed.

I felt like everyone knew a secret, and I was about to find out in the worst possible way what it was.

“Vanessa,” Claire said, coming toward me at a fast pace. “The board is waiting for you in Meeting Room 1.”

“Which members?” I asked her.

She gave me a dire look. “All of them.”

Oh. Oh, gods. That wasn’t great. In fact, that couldn’t be worse.

All of the board would only arrive here at this hour for the most serious of reasons.

The ramifications of what I had done today were going to be swift and severe.

Yet, even as my stomach churned with nervousness, I kept my head up high. Despite what Jason accused, I did not drug him. What happened, I thought, had been a chase of mutual satisfaction. I was still upset to have found out this wasn’t the case.

Well, there was nothing to do about it now but face the consequences.

“Thank you, Claire,” I said to her.

“Good luck,” she whispered as I turned and walked toward my fate.

I walked into Meeting Room 1 and stood before the board. They looked at me with grim, glum expressions, each having their own level of disapproval just from my mere presence.

“We’ve received dire news,” one of the board members said. “And we want to understand. We want to hear the reasoning from your mouth.”

When words failed the first member, another spoke up. “Alpha Jason has called to cancel both of the contracts he signed with us. In addition, we’ve been receiving calls all night from the other entrepreneurs from the second contract who are now nervous. Word travels fast, they heard about Jason’s termination of contract.”

“What we don’t understand,” said a third member, “is what exactly happened to make Jason do this. He gave no true

1/3

Pre

+25 Bonus

explanation in his phone call. He only insisted that his company and his name be removed from both contracts immediately. You were the one who was working with him, Vanessa, Can you shed some light on this for us?”

“…” I had no idea what to say. I couldn’t very well confess the truth to them, that I had slept with Jason and that he had thought I drugged him. That was far too messy, and there wasn’t exactly a good way to smooth that over. It would entirely ruin my reputation at this company. The one thing I had been trying so hard to maintain.

If Sylvia had been here, she would have been celebrating my embarrassment. My defeat.

“We would like some explanation, please,” said the first board member who had spokerk

“It’s… personal,” I said, and hoped that would be enough.

The board looked at each other, curious glances abounding around the room. I desperately tried avoiding making eye contact with any of them.

“Vanessa,” one of the board members said, retaking charge of the meeting. “You have brought your personal matters into this office one too many times. We have overlooked things of the past, because the harms had not exceeded the risks we were allowing ourselves to take but this is different. This time, you have ruined two of our most profitable contracts to date.”

Another cleared his throat. “You will fix this, Vanessa. Or we will be looking critically at your employment here. We may have to part ways.”

I couldn’t even be mad. Not really. Not when it had been my own decisions that had led me to this moment.

“I understand,” I said. “Thank you for giving me the chance to correct this.”

Twenty minutes later, I sat in my desk, lifting my phone to my ear, readying for a difficult call.

I had no idea what I was going to say to Jason. I only knew that I had to try to make this right before it festered and turned into something even worse than it already was.

I punched in the numbers for the call, then waited as the line rang, I had called Jason’s direct line but it wasn’t Jason who

answered.

“This is Beta Marcus.”

“Oh… Marcus… Hi. This is Vanessa Harper. I was hoping to speak with Jason. I know it’s late, but is he available? It’s really important.”

VERIFYCAPTCHA_LABELVerify